LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 74, 21 December 1918, Page 8

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

OUR DEMANDS AT THE PEACE CONFERENCE

THE ONE GKEAT ISSUE. Sir,—l read both jour leader of last Saturday and Dr. James Gibb's letter. Your leader was expressive of fnir Christian sentiment in regard to this war, and what .should bo our demands at tho 'i'tiicu Conference. Dr. Ciibb, for tho most part, begs tho question of the "One Great Issue." President Wilson eeems to think that we ought to include the barbaric Hun in a scheme of worldbrotherhood, but President Wilson htis absolutely refused to deal with the llohenzollerns or even visit Germany. The English-speaking communities are determined to liavo nothing whatever to do with the Holieiizollerns, or with tho Gormans as a. nation.

Has Dr. Gib!> forgotten tho horrible atrocities, the cold-blooded murders, the wanton violation of women, the murder of innocent children, and the genernl devastation and plunder of the Germans in Christian and heroic Belgium? Has he forgotten the sinking of the Lusitania or the hospital ship "Warilda? Has ho forgotten now the Germans, saved from a watery grave by thn humanitarian instinct of tho officers and men of the British Navy, spat in the faces of their rescuers? Has he forgotten 'how the women of Germany engaged in Red Cross work spat in the drinks they offered to the British prisoners, or spilt them upon the ground before the <?yes of our perishing soldiers? Has lie forgotten tho incredible cri|nc3 in utter violation of international line nnd disregard for all tho rules of civilised warfare that the German people havo pepetrated? Yet, Dr. Gibb thinks that we ought to abjure all indemnities and admit the German people into the league of Nations, and accept them into a worldbrotherhood. The idea is so revolting at this time of day that it ie utterly incapable of acceptance. Speaking on Sunday, June 23, at the Welsh Baptist Church, Oxford Street, London, Mr. Lloyd George uttered , these words—words which should be emblazoned iu largo letters vpon every printed page of either religious or secular publications:—"Lot us' settle every account with the Germans in the spirit of The Boole.'' Your leader was written, I malco no doubt, in that spirit, and it is Included in the word "reparation" for all the evils and atrocities the German nation has committed in this war. Wβ do not seek for an enduring peace if it means a peace in which the German nation can rise again and instituto a war that would Iks a repetition of all the horrors which thev have perpetrated in this. How can the Oerinaii people bo prevented from again making war? Only, by tho exaction of such indemnities as will keep them in subjection and outsido the comity of Europe for at least one hundred years to come. Reparation nioans indemnities, and these indemnities ought not to be less than the total cost of tins groat war. Common justice demands, that this shall bo done, and nothing less than this would be consistent with our settling every account in the spirit of Tho Book. Mr. Lloyd George, in the samo speech at the Baptist Church, Oxford Street, said, "That if any man stood in Hie way of such settlement of our accounts, then ho would libel tho name of Jesus Christ and that Christianity ho professed."

Dr. Gibb says he has no sympathy with the "slush of mere sentimentalism," but yet he seems to indulge largely in its expression. German frightfulness and the conduct of tho dehumanised monsters that comprised that nationhood must bo dealt, justly by, and common justice demands not only reparation, for the crimes (hey have committed but -adequate punishment and adequate payment for their brutalities and nefarious atrocities. No matter how heavy tho penalty Germans could not. be made to pay what Allied peoples have sacrificed and suffered.

The Rev, Dr. Adderjey, of London, recently found fault with the failure of the Christian Church, und said "that its chief fault was that the so-called Christians who monopolise the Church titlk as if they had u monopolj of Church ideals and Ohristian life. , ' Now thin was tho very spirit of the German Christians, and it is this spirit that incited Germany to make war. Their so-called Christian kiiltur was to be enforced upon the world by tho i'rightfulness of their conduct. The world was to be brought under German Christianity and German kultur, and if the nations would not submit (lien they had to be compelled, for the reverehd doctors of Germany preached that the diiath of protestants to such Christianity and such kultur was preferable to (heir living. These reverend gentlemen of Germany pleaded that the German nation was the medium and the instrument whereby God's kingdom was to Ix! established upon earth. Those were the aims of a people comprising this nation that Dr, Gibb would immediately admit into the comity of nations and rehabilitate their international relations. God forbid!

liike J)r. (iil)b I do not know what the attitude of the Presbyterian Church in New Zealand may prove to be, although that church may claim a first cotisinship to the Lutheran, but 1 cannot imagine anyone who lias suffered in this war, as thousands of fathers and mothers, wives, sisters, and brothers in New Zealand have suffered, wilt be ready in their generation to seek to establish a brotherhood of man that will include the barbarian Hun, for the barbarian Hun—as we now cull the German —was, comparatively speaking, and according to history, lets cruel, less atrocious, less; murderous, less vile than the 60-called Christian German nation 03 revealed by this war. Dr. Gibb could surely not.have suffered as other fathers have suffered and he can have little sympathy with those who have suffered, else lie would not indulge his imaginations with a column and a half of that "slush of nitre sentimeiitnlism" he has just 'penned, liiis.v, maybe, will the world forget 'I'lie distant work that these have done, "Conchies" may pardon and parsons may pet -I'he carrion thing they now call Hun— But never can mo and yon I'orgivo those sons of Cain Till the. dead have had their due And the seas are clear again. —1 am, etc., J. D. SIEVWBIGHT.